Color reproduction using a subtractive color method is used in normal silver halide photographic materials, and with this method yellow, magenta and cyan dye images which have a complimentary color relationship are used to reproduce blue, green and red colors.
A cyan dye is formed by a coupling reaction between a cyan dye forming compound (referred to hereinafter as a cyan coupler) and an oxidation product of a primary aromatic amine developing agent which is included in the developer in the color development process, and the cyan dye preferably absorbs only light in the red region and provides a brilliant hue.
However, the phenol type and naphthol type indoaniline dyes which are widely used as cyan dyes at the present time have unwanted absorption in the blue absorption band and in the green absorption band. Hence, in color negative films, magenta colored cyan couplers are being used with a view to correcting the unwanted absorption of the cyan dye in the green absorption band, and various compounds have been proposed for this purpose.
On the other hand, little research has been done in connection with yellow colored couplers which correct the unwanted absorption of the cyan dyes in the blue absorption band, and this has been disclosed only in JP-A-61-221748 and JP-A-59-214853. (The term "JP-A" as used herein means an "unexamined published Japanese patent application".) Furthermore, the disclosed yellow colored cyan couplers are inadequate in terms of their coupling activity and the hue of the yellow dye.